Remembrance
by x-akurei
Summary: A little Christmas fic just in time! Robin has spent his time since the summer alone, and now with the turn of the season, come strange flickers of memories and a name that he just can't place...


A Christmas fic, I suppose, written whilst I was manning a stall for my mum's business on a market (it certainly links very well to the story).  
>You also get a taster of what my ideal Christmas stall looks like... Enjoy! ^^<p>

**Disclaimer:** I still don't own anything, anyone or etc.

* * *

><p>If six months had passed at all, for Robin Branagh, they had done so at an alarming rate of which he could barely remember a thing. Since the summer, his days had passed in a frenzied blur, overlapping and sliding into each other so that they were almost incomprehensible. Now, in the middle of a freezing December, he found himself wondering where they could have possibly gone.<p>

Robin hadn't changed. Or at least, not physically. He still donned the side-swept black hair and leather jackets, was still — as his brothers liked to put it — "puny and pathetic", was still as pale as he had always been. His interests hadn't shifted; he remained fascinated with the dark, mythical world which resulted in the label of "goth" being thrown in his direction quite a lot, and he still spent copious amounts of his time reinforcing this by sketching the most morbid of things for his art class. But where in his mind there should have been a cavernous memory bank filled with his history as he had known it for the last few years, there was nothing but an empty, blank space.

It was true. Robin Branagh remembered nothing of Vladimir Dracula. His days, now mingling together without his notice, flew by in succession in response to his re-acquired loneliness. The boy was in mourning, he just didn't know it.

Still, the wipe on his memory had been weak. Vlad had never _wanted_ to do it. Now, slowly, it was starting to crack, letting little glimpses and whispers of memory slither back through the gaps, like a ray of long-awaited sunshine breaking the fog after an eternity in the darkness…

The Branagh's were Christmas shopping on the first day that Robin noticed the stir in his brain.

"Graham, look at this!" his mother exclaimed in her thick Welsh accent, picking up a small Christmas ornament from the stall they were all gathered around in the middle of the shopping centre. "Wouldn't that look lovely on your mother's mantelpiece?"

Mr Branagh "hmmed" thoughtfully in response. The twins were busying themselves with grasping at everything within their reach, arguing over which of the girls that they "admired" would appreciate each object the most, whilst Chloe cast them disapproving looks out of the corner of her eye. She, personally, preferred to assess the products from afar.

"Robin? _Robin_, come here, what do you think?"

As the middle child, Robin was used to feeling left out. He had been holding back from the rest of his family, gazing with a foul look on his face around at the decorated shopping centre. There had been a tree opposite the main stairs, and a Santa's Grotto for the children, and there were fairy lights and flashing stars strung from the ceiling. The shops had decorated their windows too, tinsel and Christmas hats adorning nearly every mannequin.

He shuffled forwards from behind his brothers, resenting having to feign interest at the merry little Santa that his mother was holding up for inspection. Its face was set with an unnaturally happy grin, with rosy cheeks and bursting buckled suit. Robin scowled at it; he hated Christmas.

Mrs Branagh tutted lightly at his lack of enthusiasm.

"Well, if you're_ that_ offended by it…"

She set the statue back down, the shoulders of the stall holder dropping disappointedly again, and began to move off to the next stall. The rest of the family followed closely behind, with Ian and Paul still squabbling.

This stall was somewhat of an oddity in Stokely. The table was shrouded in a deep crimson silk cloth, and crowded upon it were gifts and presents that catered rather more to Robin's tastes. There were statues of horned dragons curled in deep snow or crawling out of the embers of a fireplace, all dark-scaled and ferocious-looking, some breathing fire. There were mythical creatures with hooks attached to their backs, or their wings, for fixing to a Christmas tree and gargoyles for the topmost branches. Ornate candle holders with poker-straight sticks of wax for the dinner table on the 25th took their place at the left-hand side of the stall, alongside ornaments of devils and demons and fairy lights in the shape of flying bats; there were various magazines with obscure names, necklace pendants crafted from silver and some with glistening stones of ruby or amethyst or onyx, and a Book of Shadows for the bidding Wiccan to delve into their craft. To top it all, above the stall hung a banner which wished everyone a "very merry, gothic Christmas" in calligraphic writing.

Mrs Branagh moved politely along, her eyes scanning only briefly over the display. Robin, however, simply stared, as if the yearly Christmas shop had suddenly become fascinatingly interesting. As his gaze moved up over the stallholders — a girl in her early twenties with several facial piercings, a Santa hat perched on top of her multi-coloured dreadlocks, beaming happily, and her equally as cheerful partner who sported a death hawk, both in dark clothing — he couldn't help but tug self-consciously at the collar of his jacket.

"Cheer up, goth boy." Ian told him brutishly, punching him in the arm as he passed. "Turns out you're not the only weirdo in Stokely."

Paul laughed just as Mrs Branagh looked sharply back over her shoulder.

"Ian, I've told you before!"

Ian, still grinning, shrugged and followed on after her, Paul by his side, mumbling something that Robin couldn't quite make out. He was sure it wasn't the most friendly of things, though. The boy didn't move, his eyes still locked on the stall, taking in what he considered to be the _pure beauty _of it all.

"You know you can't fit any more of this stuff into your room, Robin." came Mr Branagh's voice from behind him.

Robin turned; Chloe had linked her arm around their father's, and was gazing almost curiously at the array of necklaces set out closest to her. Before he had time to argue, Mr Branagh had clamped an arm around his shoulder and was attempting to steer him away.

"You know, your mother said that she'd really like some -"

"I need to buy something, though, Dad!"

The look that Mr Branagh gave his son was incredulous, as he ducked away from him rather violently and rushed back towards the stall.

"I'll hurry him along?" Chloe offered.

As a matter of fact, it wasn't for himself that Robin was intent on buying for. He could remember flickers of _something _- a castle, an old ruin, with a crypt down deep beneath the ground, maybe even like the castle that towered above the town... There was a friend, too, Robin was sure. He had a friend and he needed to buy them something for Christmas.

"This is pretty, Robin." Chloe said, brining him back from his thoughts. She was beside him, trailing her forefinger lightly over a necklace pendant in the shape of a shooting star. She looked back at him with a meaningful look on her face, as if hinting that _she_ wanted it.

"£8, that one." came the reply from the female stall-holder.

Chloe glanced hopefully at her brother. When he didn't reply, she sighed and pressed. "What _are_ you looking for?"

"A gift." Robin told her quietly, chewing the inside of his cheek.

It was strange: he had such a strong feeling, was positive, that he needed to buy a present for someone, though what was irritating him was his lack of knowledge as to who.

Chloe's question, highlighting this, made him cringe. "For who?"

Robin shook his head. There was a name. A name plucking at his mind which he knew but couldn't quite remember. It was as if he was missing something vital, a part of his life that ought to be there, but wasn't…

"I - can't remember." he choked out honestly at last. Glancing down, he avoided his sister's eyes; he was now very aware that she was staring back at him with raised eyebrows, confused, disbelieving.

"Do you want that necklace, then?" he murmured, if only to change the subject. He didn't want to look like an idiot, certainly not in front of _these _people - probably the _only_ civilians in the whole of Stokely, or even Wales perhaps, who valued the same things as he did. If he spent his money anywhere, Robin reasoned, it would be with them. Chloe was already grinning and nodding in response.

After a much appreciated purchase and some several minutes later, when the pendant had been tucked neatly inside a little gift box and then a paper bag, she and Robin hurried on to find their parents again. His sister was grinning widely, though promised to be thoroughly surprised on Christmas day as Robin folded the bag around itself, and slipped the now square package into his pocket. By the time they caught up to the rest of the Branagh's, they were quite out of breath.

It was only much later, as Robin was lying in bed, the snow falling fast in swirling flakes outside the window, that the realisation came to him.

"_Vlad_," he whispered into the darkness.

He knew as soon as he'd said it aloud: that was the name. Maybe it was an odd name to remember suddenly, out of a blue. In fact, Robin had no recognition of how it was linked to him at all, or of why he couldn't remember anything to do with it. But the name felt right, it _sounded_ right, and Robin repeated it several times over just to prove it to himself. Whoever the boy _was_, whoever Vlad _had_ been, Robin was certain of one thing - he had existed, and they had been friends.

* * *

><p>-<strong> x-akurei<strong>

Okay lovelies, that's it until after the New Year now, and again I can only wish you a lovely Christmas and the best of New Years!  
>See you all in 2012. :)<p> 


End file.
